852 
NATURE 
[JUNE 23, 1923 

the mathematicians of Uppsala during the seventeenth 
century, the former being the author of a commentary 
on Euclid and works on astronomy and mechanics. 
The grandson of the latter, Magnus Celsius, was 
Anders Celsius (1701-1744) who accompanied Clairaut 
and Maupertuis on their degree-measuring expedition 
to Lapland. To him we are indebted for the Centigrade 
thermometer. For some years he was professor of 
astronomy at Uppsala. 
The great Swedenborg (1688-1772), the learned 
Klingenstierna (1698-1785), Martin Stroemer (1707-— 
1770), Peter Elvius (1710-1749), and Peter Wargentin 
(1717-1783) were all either students or professors at 
Uppsala, as was Melanderhjelm (1726-1810), whom 
Brougham met when he attended a meeting of the 
Royal Academy of Sciences at Stockholm in 1799. 
Klingenstierna was the discoverer of the fact that 
refraction of light could be produced without colour ; 
Stroemer made the first Swedish translation of Euclid, 
while Wargentin devoted much of his life to a study 
of Jupiter’s satellites and was associated with Lacaille 
in his work on the parallax of the moon. He was also 
the first director of the observatory at Stockholm 
founded in 1759 largely through the instrumentality 
of the capable and public-spirited administrator, 
Claude Grill (1704-1767). 
Of all the men of science connected with Uppsala 
the place of honour must be given to Linnzus, whose 
tomb is in the Cathedral there. Whether we think 
of him as a boy watching the bees and flowers in his 
father’s beautiful garden at Rashult, as the budding 
botanist at the school at Wexio, or as the struggling 
student first at Lund and then at Uppsala, or again 
as the intrepid explorer in the wilds of Lapland, we are 
impressed with his untiring energy and his singleness 
of purpose. Born in 1707, at the age of twenty-three 
Linneus became an assistant professor at Uppsala, 
but the years 1735 to 1738 he spent in travel. In 
Holland he became the friend of Boerhaave and worked 
in the garden of the wealthy Cliffort, near Haarlem. 
He also visited England, France, and Germany, and 
it was during this time he brought out the first edition 
of his “ Systema Natura.” Returning to Sweden he 
was made the president of the newly founded Academy 
of Sciences at Stockholm, and in 1741 became professor 
of anatomy at Uppsala, where he died on January ro, 
1778. With his never-ceasing industry he combined 
a passionate love of order, and it has been said that 
thus “he was able to serve his own generation with 
great effect, to methodise the labour of naturalists, 
to devise useful expedients for lightening their toil, 
and to apply scientific knowledge to the practical 
purposes of life.” 
Contemporary with Linneus, but occupied with 
a different branch of science, was Johann Wallerius 
(1709-1785), the writer of many scientific books and 
for a long time professor of chemistry, metallurgy, 
and pharmacy, It was to his chair that Bergmann 
succeeded in 1767. A native of West Gothland, 
where he was born in 1735, Bergmann as a student 
came under the influence of L'nneus and passed 
nearly the whole of his life at Uppsala. He was one 
of the earliest chemists to deal with chemical problems 
in a strictly scientific manner, and he was the pioneer 
of systematic chemical analysis. Holding his chair 
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until his death in 1784, he counted among his pupils 
Johann Gahn (1745-1818), who added manganese 
to the list of elements and instructed Berzelius in the 
use of the blowpipe, and Johann Gadolin (1760-1852). 
Gadolin became a professor at the university of Abo, 
then belonging to Sweden, and*to him Finland was 
indebted for the introduction of a knowledge of the 
discoveries of Lavoisier and the other French chemists. 
The town and university of Abo were destroyed by 
fire in 1827, but when visited by Bishop Heber, the 
writer of the hymn “ From Greenland’s icy mountains,” 
in 1805, he described it as “‘a place possessing an 
archbishop, fifteen professors, three hundred students, 
a ruined castle, a whitewashed cathedral, and certainly 
the most northerly university in Europe.” 
Gadolin had been a candidate for the chair left 
vacant by the death of Bergmann, but this was given 
to Afzelius (1755-1837). Bergmann’s greatest con- 
temporary was undoubtedly Scheele. Seven years 
younger than Bergmann, Scheele began life as an 
apprentice in Gothenburg. From Gothenburg he 
removed to Malmé, then to Stockholm and to Uppsala, 
and finally settled at Koping where he purchased a 
business. It was here he made his great discovery 
of oxygen. Endowed with a genius for resolving the 
most obscure chemical reactions, Scheele stands 
almost unrivalled for the number and value of his 
discoveries. He died two years after Bergmann, and 
his statue now adorns the Swedish capital. 
Though, with the death of Bergmann and of Scheele, 
the progress of chemical discovery slackened some- 
what, the greatest of Swedish chemists had yet to 
appear. LBerzelius, who stands beside Linneus in 
the roll of Swedish science, was born in 1779, a year 
after Davy. In 1798—the year Davy went as assistant 
to Beddoes at Clifton—Berzelius became an assistant 
to the medical superintendent at Medvi. While 
Davy was establishing his reputation at the Royal 
Institution, Berzelius as a professor of medicine was 
gaining the admiration of Stockholm, and on Davy’s 
death in 1829 he was recognised as the leading chemist 
in the world. Sir William Ramsay once remarked 
that he believed that since the time of Boyle none ~ 
had done more for the advancement of chemistry 
than had Berzelius. His kitchen laboratory at Stock- 
holm was as famous as that of Lord Kelvin in the 
cellar beneath the old College of Glasgow. Dulong, 
Mitscherlich, Gmelin, Gustav and Heinrich Rose 
were all taught there by the great master, and Wohler 
has fortunately left a description of it. “ The labora- 
tory,” he said, “‘consisted of two ordinary rooms 
furnished in the simplest possible manner; there 
were no furnaces or draught places, neither gas nor 
water supply. In one of these rooms were two common 
deal tables; at one of these Berzelius worked, the 
other was intended for me. On the walls were a few 
cupboards for reagents ; in the middle was a mercury 
trough, while the glass blower’s lamp stood on the 
hearth. In addition was a sink, where the despotic 
Anna, the cook, had daily to clean the apparatus.” 
When in 1833 Berzelius married, the King of Sweden 
wrote of him, ‘“‘ Sweden and the whole world were 
debtors to the man whose entire life had been devoted 
to pursuits as useful to all as they were glorious to 
his native country.” 
